War party
by livefonos
Summary: I've finished reading some review's and i thank you all, except that little irish highschool wanker, who dont have the juevos to sign his reviews. Cant wait to see you in that alley.


War Party  
  
The people where asleep, But the chief was still awake. His little boy at his side staring up into the night's sky. "Father when we die, where do we go" The chief smiled "Where would you like to go" the boy made a face like he had bitten into a bad lemon "Do you always have to answer with riddles?" the chief laughed as calm as the morning wind "Well our people believe that when our time on this world is over, the great chief of the sky will send a crow to carry our souls to his home, where we will spend eternity with our ancestors of the past." The boy thought it over for a moment "So old yucca is up there waiting for me" he asked with all the innocence in the world "yes, and even your old dog hudwala is up there waiting for you" the boy giggled with glee "now hurry to bed or else the chief of dreams will pass you, and leave his brother of nightmares to sing you to sleep" satisfied with his fathers answer he walked briskly to bed.  
The past months the chief had not slept at all, a war tribe called the warcehta had been seen camping near his safe grounds, two scouts were sent to make peace with them, one came back with the others head in a parchment. The chief had hoped to lose the warcehta in the grand mountain just beyond the riverbeds, but the warcehta where merciless hunters, said to eat the flesh of the dead. And he knew that soon enough that his tribe would eventually have a confrontation with them, a confrontation they could not win. It saddened him deeply, his tribe had never had a single war with any other tribe, in fact they where considered the most peaceful within the region.  
He continued his pace around the campgrounds until dawn. That day his mood was anything but ordinary, the feeling of imperative doom was more unsettling than he had liked it to be. Outside he could tell his horse was just as worried as he was. "Two tone, we have been through much these last moons, we have survived the drought of last season together, the scarce hunting this winter has proved to be endless, yet by my side you still stand" he looked endlessly into his old friends eyes looking for an answer that was never there. The horse itself had noticed his chiefs despair and had tried to cheer him up by nestling behind his ears, but any attempts to arouse the chief from his unrest was all in vain.  
Faintly in the setting sunset the chief could hear the cawing of a distant crow. Awaking him from his painful thoughts he stared into the abyss that was the surrounding forest. And then from somewhere in the trees another crow was cawing, then another, and another. He looked closely into the shadows of the forest and could make out the figures of several tribesman dressed in war paint. And from the dawn of the clearing the warcehta came screeching in a barely audible tongue. The chief mounted his horse and called to his people. The men came with old hunting bows and spears waiting their next request "hold them long enough for the women and children to escape". The warcehta was on them quicker then vultures on carrion. The chief put his spear in all that would accept its end, but the warcehta where many, and the poor weapons the chiefs men had seemed merely only to feed the warcehta' s thirst.  
The chief watched in anguish as one by one his tribe members where slaughtered, the warcehta laughed in his face as they took scalps from the dead. One of the warcehta had removed the chief's son's head and placed it on a spear and danced around with it, passing it to others members laughing. They left only the chief alive, shackling his hands and feet. They tied one of the ropes around a horse and dragged him back to their camp.  
Only skeletons on stakes littered the camp of the warcehta. A hut of skulls seemed to be the only erected marker for their chief. They stripped the chief and took him inside the hut, where carcasses of bodies hung upside down, stripped of meat and flesh. "Welcome" said a man sitting on a pile of corroded bones. He wore a headdress that seem to be carved out of the skulls of shadows, charred and black from the warcehta's flame. "May I ask what you are doing in our territory?" the chief said nothing, only stood with his head bowed in prayer. "Oh dear sweet chief, still praying to your god, stilling groveling at his feet for mercy, fool, what god do you see before you other than myself. Hmm what god would waste his time on a sniveling coward who didn't even have the strength to save his own kind" still the chief was silent "perhaps you are not hearing me, maybe in the fight you lost your ability to understand when people are talking to you, maybe your ears need to be opened a little more hmm" he nodded to the men on the side of the chief, they unsheathed their hunting knives and cut off the chiefs ears. Even then he said not a word "Proud chief, you have much honor in your eyes, and you have much hate in them as well, do you wish me dead?" the chief was silent for a minute then he screamed "I wish you never existed!" the room filled with the laughter of the dead. "Never existed, is that anyway to treat a host? Is that anyway to treat the man who now holds your life in his hands?" For the first time the chief stared in the eyes of his enemy "You hold nothing in your hands that you have not stolen, you are the coward not I" again the dead began to laugh "Coward, I think not dear chief, when the pale face first came to my land, he was meet with the sound of his families throat being cut, I am not the man who trades with demons, they brought only sickness, they brought only diseased women, they brought hunger. And you and your kind welcomed them with open arms, had them sit with you at your table, had them feed you lies about peaceful coexistence. You are the coward, you are the fool" the chief knew it was true, the pale faces where a different kind of creature, only ruled by the moral of things, they did not respect the land, they raped it of all its beauty and moved on like locust. "Yes the visitors from the east, they were unkind to our ways, but my god tells me that it is not my duty to judge others, that is designed for him." The chief of the warcehta laughed again "duty? You would dare speak to me about rightful duty, I stood up to the aggressor, you bowed to them, my duty is to ensure the survival of my kind, and see to it that lambs like you are hunted down and slaughtered, and now it is time for you to witness how little mercy I or your god has" He nodded for the final time to the men at his side. They took the chief bound to a back room, where a giant fire licked the ceiling. '" Bind him to the alter" they strapped the chief to a gothic looking sundial, feet and hands pointing toward two demonic statues, no doubt angry gods of the warcehta. " You shall have the honor of being sacrificed to our gods, know that when you die your soul shall be bound to him as his slave" the chief was quite, even as they removed his heart he remained silent...then darkness.  
  
He awoke to the sound of a morning lark. Staring at the blazing sun above. As he rose his legs felt as though they hadn't been used in years. His face stuck to the bloody ground where the warcehta had laid him. He scanned his surroundings, and found that he was alone with nothing but ashes and bones. He was home.  
Each face of the dead he passed had their fist clenched in anger. All of his tribesman where there, his son's body lay under the oak tree where he used to play. Ashe walked through the remains of his camp he saw one soul the warcehta had not taken. " TWO TONE!" he screamed as he ran to where his friend was grazing, on the one patch of earth untouched by his people's blood. The horse paid no attention to him as he approached. He sat next to his ancient friend and patted his head lightly. The horse looked at him with all the sadness one could ever have. "Yes, I know" he told his horse " I hear them to in my head screaming, our people can not sleep, justice has not yet been served, they cry for blood, and we shall answer that cry, come much is to be done.'' He mounted his friend and together they road in the direction of the warcehta.  
He gathered what little weapons where left behind, and a few boxes of the firewater they had gotten from a few settlers. He had never touched a single drop of it, not even at the hunting parties, all it did was seem to numb people senses, and he would need them all. Fortunately the warcehta where not difficult to find, all he had to do was fallow the bodies of his tribesman. As he approached he could hear the familure laughter coming from the hut made of bones.  
"Im sorry my friend but today more blood will be spilt, more of our blood, but soon... soon we shall be at ease." He quickly cut down the surrounding trees and shrubbery a few hundred feet from the warcehta, and doused it with the firewater. He was going to make sure no one could escape. " And now two tone we shall ride into the mouth of hell for the last time". He lit the fuel ablaze and road furiously toward the warcehta. They all screamed as the chief took them one by one. He cut through them all with his spear. Those who tried to escape where met with a wall of fire. The chief fought into the night making sure that all the warcehta had met the end of his blade. When he was sure that all where dead he took the scalp of every man he found. When he came to the one who killed his son, he removed his head from the dead carcasses and proudly marched through the camp of the warcehta with his head displayed on his spear.  
Soon the flames died down, and it was time for the chief to be with his people. While he rode toward his camp he stopped and buried the bodies of his people that littered his trail. The scalps that hung from his spear and chest flapped in the wind. Two tone had four large spears in his side. The ride home was a silent one. When he reached the campground of his people he began to dig a grave. When he was finished his horse looked a question at him. "Yes my friend this one is for you". Two tone crawled into the grave laid down, gave his chief one last look and fell asleep. The chief then dug his final grave, laid inside, and just as he was closing his eyes a crow landed on his chest. 


End file.
